High speed data communications and the devices that enable such communications have become ubiquitous in modern society. These devices make many users capable of maintaining nearly continuous connectivity to the Internet and other communication networks. Although these high speed data connections are available through telephone lines, cable modems or other such devices that have a physical wired connection, wireless connections have revolutionized our ability to stay connected without sacrificing mobility.
Traditionally, antennas have been defined as metallic devices for radiating or receiving radio waves. The paradigm for antenna design has traditionally been focused on antenna geometry, physical dimensions, material selection, electrical coupling configurations, multi-array design, and/or electromagnetic waveform characteristics such as transmission wavelength, transmission efficiency, transmission waveform reflection, etc. As such, technology has advanced to provide many unique antenna designs for a wide range of applications.
More recently, some attention has been paid to the highly reconfigurable nature of plasma for use in and with antennas. In particular, plasma has the ability to turn on and off quickly, and can be extremely flexible in terms of rapid reconfiguration. Accordingly, for example, a plasma element can be configured to rapidly change characteristics that may impact the ability of the plasma element to transmit, receive, filter, reflect and/or refract radiation. Given the significant increases in flexibility and configurability that can be achieved using plasma, recent attention has been paid to improve antenna designs that employ plasma elements in one way or another.